Dick Spotswood: Time to scale back proposed 101 project

THE Transportation Authority of Marin, in conjunction with Caltrans has already managed to spend almost $8 million on the controversial Highway 101-Greenbrae Twin Cities Corridor Improvement Project.

TAM is composed of all five members of the county Board of Supervisors and representatives from Marin's 11 incorporated cities.

Where did the money go? As of Dec. 31, of the $7.9 million total, $715,666 went from regional government coffers to reimburse TAM for large shares of the salaries of its executive director, Dianne Steinhauser, and project manager, Bill Whitney, over the six years since the project was first funded.

Another $294,920 went toward their general overhead costs.

During that time, $6.9 million has gone to the agency's consultant, Jacobs Engineering, for engineering and environmental services.

The expenditures were disclosed in an "updated initial project report," an obscure document filed with the Metropolitan Transportation Commission. The document was unearthed by a diligent IJ reader.

The initial reaction questions how so much could be spent when not one inch of freeway has been rebuilt.

Certainly, some environmental review and engineering is essential and it's not free.

The good news is that the resulting public hearings have done their job. They've demonstrated that large numbers of Marinites along with Corte Madera's Town Council consider the current version of the project deeply flawed.

The plan doesn't increase freeway capacity nor does it deal with persistent flooding that has bedeviled motorists for years. There are cheaper and less disruptive methods to address traffic management on this short stretch of highway.

Some project opponents favor reenvisioning the concept into something far less expensive that both improves this section of Highway 101 while diverting some of the allocated funds to more worthy projects.

There is a misimpression that all of the cash for this scheme comes from the long-forgotten 2004 Regional Measure 2. That under-the-radar ballot item raised tolls by $1 on bay bridges, except the Golden Gate Bridge, to fund a laundry list of Bay Area pork barrel projects.

Only $49 million of this $143 million project comes from RM-2. The other $94 million is federal gas tax dollars allocated by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, RM-2's administrator.

The federal money comes with far more requirements demanding an even higher percentage go to arguably needless paperwork.

The Greenbrae-Twin Cities Corridor project is a textbook example of mission creep.

A modest Larkspur proposal for the Greenbrae Interchange morphed into Caltrans' wish list when MTC found extra money from Uncle Sam.

A better approach is a redesign using only the RM-2 $49 million. Then the trick is petitioning MTC to divert the $94 million federal gas tax money toward more needed highway and transportation improvements elsewhere in Marin.

Expansion of the jam-packed Larkspur Ferry Terminal parking lot is one transit-boosting alternative.

A down-scaled project could accomplish much, but not all, of what TAM believes is essential.

Gone would be the massive Los Angeles-style southbound flyover. The retained elements would address the less controversial northbound freeway lanes. That precipitates less disruption, incurs lower expenses and allows retention of the popular bike and pedestrian overpass currently slated for demolition.

The job of diverting the $94 million in freed-up federal gas tax money would then go to Marin Supervisor Steve Kinsey. He's the project's co-parent and Marin's go-to guy when it comes to the MTC. The West and Central Marin supervisor is a key ally of Steve Heminger, the powerful multi-county agency's publicity-shy honcho.

This is Kinsey's opportunity to gracefully facilitate a compromise that improves 101 while satisfying Marin's other unmet but more pressing mobility needs.

Columnist Dick Spotswood of Mill Valley now shares his views on local politics twice weekly in the IJ. His email address is spotswood@comcast.net.